"We had nothing, literally nothing. We had — I can't even say the clothes on our back … they were ripped, tattered, ankle freezers, too small … shoes that were holey. Oh God."

Monique is speaking about growing up in the most run-down section of one of Melbourne's poorest suburbs, Broadmeadows.

And now, on a cold grey day, she's come to revisit the scene of her nightmarish childhood — the block of public housing known as the "Broadie Bronx".

"It's like the house of f***ing horrors," Monique mutters as she stands in front of the bleak 70s-style double-storey unit she lived in with her drug-addled step-mother and terrifyingly violent father.

"One of my siblings was crying because he'd [her father] just bashed my step-mum and she was pregnant," she said.

"I went over to comfort my sibling and he said 'don't touch her' and picked me up by the hair and threw me into a cabinet."

Her father formed a new relationship with a woman, Sheridan, who was also addicted to drugs.

"Heroin, ice, methadone, marijuana, pills, Xanax," Monique remembers.

"Anything they could get their hands on, literally anything."

Instead of paying the rent and bills and looking after their kids and feeding them, they would spend money on drugs and alcohol.

"You'd never see my dad without a VB can. That was his priority. We were just a pay cheque," Monique said.

She recalls one day being excited that her father agreed to take the family to the local pool.

"When we were ready to go Sheridan said, 'Come on, let's go', and they were playing Play Station and James (Monique's brother) turned off the Play Station, so my dad cracked the shits and hit him and stabbed Sheridan in the head for no reason," Monique recalls.

Despite having limited income, and raising her own 9-year-old son, Mel is now considering becoming a foster mother to other children in need.

"It's so worth it. As hard as it was, because there were times when it was really hard, I'd just think, 'Mel, you're doing a good job'. Having your own child, it's great, but helping a child who has been in danger, it's more rewarding," she said.

Monique was safe and loved at Mel and Peter's place.

But it took time for her to adjust.

"Getting up going to school, having dinner every night, brushing my teeth, having clean clothes, going to bed, having new clothes, new shoes, having everything I needed, having all my school stuff, having lunch for school!

"It wasn't until I had had that for a year and I knew it wasn't going anywhere that I felt, okay, this is normal," Monique said.

But against her wishes, a court ordered Monique to see her father, and Mel was forced to take her.

"She would cry, carry on, wouldn't get out of the car, would be in hysterics, didn't want to see him, didn't want to go to her dad's, but it was court ordered and I had to do it," Mel said.

Melbourne University researcher Meredith Kiraly says there's very little support for kinship carers or awareness they even exist.

"I think of them as ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Sometimes they're raising other people's children against amazing odds. They might have very little money, managing very challenging families around them," Ms Kiraly said.

Mel received regular government payments to care for Monique, but not all kinship carers do, particularly if it is an informal family custody arrangement.

Ms Kiraly has been interviewing dozens of young kinship carers around the country.